Bacon lovers might want to hog it

If you're accustomed to pigging out on bacon, be prepared to eat the cost.

CHAD SMITH

If you're accustomed to pigging out on bacon, be prepared to eat the cost.

In what is being dubbed a "porkapocalypse," the National Pig Association reported that a "world shortage of pork and bacon (in 2013) is unavoidable."

The British trade group said that the drought conditions that plagued much of the U.S. in 2012 drove up the price of corn feed, the main source of food for most pigs.

Under normal circumstances, farmers fatten up their pigs by feeding them lots of corn feed. A heavier pig is usually a more valuable pig.

But because feed prices have been so high, farmers have been unloading their pigs at the slaughterhouse in a more precipitous fashion. That ultimately means that in 2013, fewer pigs will be around, and that, the USDA says, could drive the price of pork up by about 3 percent.

"The price of one pound of bacon is already high, and you can't feed that many people with one pound of bacon, so if the price goes any higher, forget it," said Pam Wilson of East Stroudsburg.

But the prospect of higher pork prices didn't faze Linda Collazo, a Reeders resident with a penchant for pork.

"I'd pay the difference," said Collazo, who had just finished eating ham and eggs at the Arlington Diner in Stroud Township on Tuesday.

Collazo's friend, Alice Possinger of Snydersville, said that she, too, would have no problem paying a bit more for bacon because "I support farmers and want farmers to do well."

Dan Seidof, no doubt, would find such a statement encouraging.

The West End farmer raises pigs but he said that ever since April, when the cost of feed started spiking, he has been forced to charge about a third more for his pigs. Seidof said that his prices will go down once feed prices go down.

According to Ricky Volpe, a research economist with the USDA, pork prices "should be on the road to recovery by 2014."

And if they're not, Nancy Vega of Marshalls Creek will have to change her breakfast habits.

Vega, who was finishing her shopping at Walmart Tuesday, said she likes to eat bacon once a week. But if prices spike, she said she is going to substitute bacon with something else.

"Probably with pancakes," she said.

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